The New Mundane – Eryka Collins
There are so many sounds that pass you by every single day, but do you hear them? Having this be my first year at the University of Vermont, I hear a lot of sounds in my new everyday life here. As I listen back on them, it’s interesting to really hear things that I don’t really pay much attention to. It’s like when Schafer mentions in, “Open Ears”, that we don’t have lids for our ears, but we don’t hear every single thing either. In my podcast, I focus on the mundane sounds of my life here at UVM. And although they are mundane noises, some of them were not apart of my life prior to coming to UVM. The sounds in this take you through a day in my life here, allowing you to almost picture it with each sound that happens.
I start my podcast off with the sound of my alarm going off. It starts the majority of my mornings here, and with that, I found it fitting to start my podcast off with it. Next, I follow my morning routine with walking to the bathroom and taking a shower. After that, I started recording more of my morning. The next sound is walking downstairs in my dorm’s stairwell. This sound frequents my day, as I travel up and down these stairs multiple times in one day. Walking down the stairwell you can hear other residents of the building. Although this is now a norm for me, its quite different from my average life back home. Walking down the stairs at my apartment consists of silence except for my feet stomping down the stairs. Now, it consists of my feet stomping down the stairs and the noises of people’s conversations. After I walk downstairs, I walk over to my bike and ride it to my classes. I ride my bike everywhere and it is my main source of transportation on and off campus. Next in my morning, I usually stop and get coffee at Henderson’s, which has become my new home. Coffee is the reason I can get through my long days here at UVM. The next sound is the swirling of iced coffee, which is what I get whenever I buy coffee, no matter the temperature outside. The sound of the iced coffee is something that I hear almost everyday. After coffee, I start my classes. My favorite class this semester, so far is music theory, so I recorded a small part of the lecture. Once I’m finished with my classes for the day I walk back to my dorm to do my homework. The sounds of people walking past me as I walk back to my room after classes are something that is in constant background of my new reality here at UVM. Its something that I realized I tune out. After listening back on it, there are a lot of sounds that are around me that I never really realized that are there. Listening through the microphone from my phone made me realize how much more there is to listen to and allowed me to listen with new ears like what English says in their article called, “The Sounds Around Us”. In it, English says that microphones don’t have the capability to tune things out like human ears do, so it gives you a new aural experience. Once I’m back in my room, I start doing homework while listening to music, which explains my next sound which is me typing and my music playing on in the background. After a long day of classes and studying, my day ends with dinner in the dining halls with my friends and that is also what is the last sound on my podcast. Although things like these sounds are apart of my everyday life, some of them are still new to me and my new world here at UVM.
Work Cited:
- English, Lawerence. “The Sounds around Us: An Introduction to Field Recording.” (2015)
- Schafer, Murray. Open Ears. Print.
- Wild Horses – The Rolling Stones
As other people in the class wrote, the title “The New Mundane” is an amazing title because it makes it so easy for people getting ready to listen to the sounds understand what they will be listening to. I enjoyed reading your analysis of our ears not having lids because it showed how you are forced to listen to these sounds everyday, which makes it the new norm for you regardless of whether or not you can tune them out. I can also empathize with the fact that you have had to get used to the sounds of a noisey hall because my hall is so loud no matter what time of the day it is. Along with this, I am a major fan of your coffee choice. There is nothing better than a nice cup of iced coffee! Moving onto the recordings of the songs, I agree with the other commenters when they said that they were perfectly placed together. This is something I struggled with while recording the sounds for my project, so I was impressed by how easy you made it look (or sound if we want to get technical). Overall, I think you did a great job!
Your title drew me in immediately. It it very creative and it was a great choice. Also as mentioned by pretty much everyone else, all of your sounds flowed very well. The transition from one to the next was seamless which made it easy and fun to listen to. By listening to your podcast, I also learned more about you that I didn’t already know. For example, that you bike everywhere. That is so cool, and if I hadn’t listened to this I would never have known that about you. You did an awesome job!
I loved how well the sounds flowed together, it felt like I was going through a day in your life. I really enjoyed how you could hear the conversations of other people as you walked past them, this is something I incorporated in my podcast as well. I also put emphasis on my daily coffee routine. Well done!
I enjoyed your podcast and found a few similarities between yours, mine, and other students in the class. I thought it was good that everything was seamless, it showed a command over the sometimes confusing and touchy program Audacity. Your essay flowed well and took good stances on the mundane. I liked how you compared your sounds that you here to the sounds that you hear back home, something I never considered, and have yet to read in any of the other essays. I also thought that the comparison between English’s analysis of the microphone and how we hear was well thought out and intriguing. I also agree wholeheartedly with your statement that coffee gets you through the long days. A life without coffee and espresso shots would be miserable.
I thought this was great. Your concept of the “new mundane” is one that I discussed as well in my podcast. I even used some of the same sounds as you. I liked that you included part of your music theory lecture. It made it a lot more personal to you as opposed to just general and vague sounds. I liked your reference to “The Sounds Around Us” also. The concept of the microphone not tuning out the background noise is very interesting, and adds a whole new perception to the piece. It definitely strikes me as some sort of field recordings, if you will. Overall, it was a pretty good sound list. As far as writing, the only critique I have is you could organize it a bit better so the explanation of your sounds makes a little more sense and flows better. Other than that, I thought this was awesome.
I liked how in your podcast the sounds flowed seamlessly together without any noticeable breaks in between them. In your explanation , the first part of your intro in is strong, but you should avoid from asking rhetorical questions because they shift the focus away from the topic at hand. Although it is ok to use “I”, you use it numerous times throughout your essay. I suggest just writing first, and then going back and try to reword some of these sentences. In your main body paragraph, you immediately listed off all of the sounds in your podcast. Next time try not to make is so one after the other. Once you introduce the first sound, this is the perfect opportunity to further explain the importance of the sound and why you chose to put it at that moment. With even just one or two short sentences interjected in between each sound, it not only makes getting the appropriate length a lot easier, but the piece will appear more natural. Second, your one main body paragraph is too long. The beauty of writing is that you don’t have to follow a specific format. This even applies to paragraphs to some extent, as there is no true recommended length (usually needs to be at least four sentences), but generally speaking shorter essays have shorter paragraphs where longer essays tend to have longer ones. There should always be more than two paragraphs, as there should be a distinct intro, body and conclusion to the piece. If there is any shift in tone, new ideas introduced, further analysis of a point, add create a paragraph break. It makes the piece easier to read and makes it easier for the reader to see a separation in thoughts and ideas. On a side note, great song choice :).